I had the opportunity to talk to the previous owner of my car.
They told me that they owned it for about 85k miles and four years (Carfax confirms).
Out of curiosity, I asked them if it had given them any trouble, they said no.
But my real question was "how often did you change the oil?" I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it was done earlier than the OLM dictated (they said around 5,000 miles); of course, like most cars on the road, it got conventional oil. Carfax didn't have much for info in this time; they told me they went to a variety of places "wherever I happened to be when it needed an oil change", which makes me think it was held fairly strictly to the 5,000 mile mark. Looking in the oil fill cap, what I can see of the engine looks clean and non-sludged.
My question is this: knowing that the GM 3800 V6 (Series 3) got conventional from 50-135k miles, changed regularly, and that it burns about a quart in 3000 (on synthetic) - 4000 (on conventional) miles, I am considering possibly going back to using a quality conventional changed on that same schedule?
Of course, there are benefits to running synthetic (as I have done for the most part over the last 2 years) but the engine has seen conventional for most of its life.
I am comfortable with running conventional that long, but definitely not 10,000 miles as suggested by the OLM, with "mostly highway service". Honestly, I don't really like the idea of running synthetic too much longer than that, anyway.
I might use MS5K, Chevron Supreme, Formula Shell, etc. and a decent (OEM) filter. These would be quite cheap OCIs then. And if it's what the car got most of its life...
Thoughts?? What would you do?
They told me that they owned it for about 85k miles and four years (Carfax confirms).
Out of curiosity, I asked them if it had given them any trouble, they said no.
But my real question was "how often did you change the oil?" I was pleasantly surprised to find out that it was done earlier than the OLM dictated (they said around 5,000 miles); of course, like most cars on the road, it got conventional oil. Carfax didn't have much for info in this time; they told me they went to a variety of places "wherever I happened to be when it needed an oil change", which makes me think it was held fairly strictly to the 5,000 mile mark. Looking in the oil fill cap, what I can see of the engine looks clean and non-sludged.
My question is this: knowing that the GM 3800 V6 (Series 3) got conventional from 50-135k miles, changed regularly, and that it burns about a quart in 3000 (on synthetic) - 4000 (on conventional) miles, I am considering possibly going back to using a quality conventional changed on that same schedule?
Of course, there are benefits to running synthetic (as I have done for the most part over the last 2 years) but the engine has seen conventional for most of its life.
I am comfortable with running conventional that long, but definitely not 10,000 miles as suggested by the OLM, with "mostly highway service". Honestly, I don't really like the idea of running synthetic too much longer than that, anyway.
I might use MS5K, Chevron Supreme, Formula Shell, etc. and a decent (OEM) filter. These would be quite cheap OCIs then. And if it's what the car got most of its life...
Thoughts?? What would you do?